Tuesday, June 26, 2007

My Favorite Mystery: Loch Ness

I've always been fascinated by the legend of the Loch Ness Monster. The fact that it's called a "monster" at all, and not just a "mystery," shows that we all love our bogey stories, and we love the thought of something undiscovered out there, like a UFO or life on other planets. In a way, I'm content to just let all those mysteries be. It's the mystery that creates the wonder, not the solution.

This famous photo of "Nessie" was taken by a surgeon on vacation at Loch Ness in the 1930's. I believe it's the most famous photo of the monster. However, recently someone else has added to the Nessie museum of evidence. A man named Gordon Holmes has video footage of something he saw in the Loch.

From ABC News: "'I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this jet black thing, about 45 feet long, moving fairly fast in the water,' said Gordon Holmes, the 55-year-old a lab technician from Shipley, Yorkshire, who took the video Saturday."

Holmes' video has got people talking again, and the skeptics say he has done it just in time for tourist season. But the romantics like me say that the monster does exist--that in fact he cannot live there alone, but must have a family. What he is remains a mystery, and that mystery is compounded by the fact that Loch Ness is huge, and deeper than the North Sea.

Scientists have tried to find the monster before, but without luck. The question is, do we really want it found? Or would we prefer to cling to possibility?

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